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THE. 

NORTHLAND 
BIRD * LIFE 

The GoldenB>o oi^g^hjic Birds 

^S^PVUSHELL 

^JUTHOQ OF- STRAnGE LAMD • BIR.D LIFE. 
THE • D in HEEL- THAT • VAS AL^AVS • THERE. 

:• LITTLE BOV FRAnCE, £TC 



rJUST-RIGHT-BOOKS I 

ALBERT • ^HITr-T/A.r^ • COnPAITV 

.PUBLISHERS. 

CHICAGO. . LJ.S.iA. 

















THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 

Copyright, 1924, by Albert Whitman & Co. 
Chicago, Ill. 



V -1 




A JUST RIGHT BOOK 
Published in the U. S. A. 


Jill 30 1325 

©Gl A864279 /J/A, /, 



















































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CONTENTS 

PAGE 

The Baby Laughing Loon, the Puffins and the Hunter 7 

Tommie Specks, Gray Geese and the Crane .... 15 

Mother Specks’ Nest.24 

The Tomcod Family Reunion. 32 

Tommy Discovers Old Sea Serpent. 38 

Baby Laughing Loon Strays Away.46 

Pirates Spoil the Puffin Concert.53 

Little Baby Laughing Loon Learns to Play Submarine . 61 

Philander Gray Goose and Dungemess Crab .... 70 

Stately Miss Swan. 78 

Little Miss Snow Bunting.87 

Old Tramp Stormy Petrel.9 7 

Little Baby Laughing Loon Meets Little Brown Seal 1 04 

Pirates Again.112 

God’s Great Moving Pictures.121 















I 



In they plunged. 

(From Philander Gray Goose and Dungemess Crab) 


































































































[jTrrrrri] 


The Northland Bird Life 



THE BABY LAUGHING LOON, THE 
PUFFINS AND THE HUNTER 

Were Little Baby Laughing Loon here, 
she could tell us in her way that on the 
sunny slopes of Happy Island there are the 
most wonderful wild-flower gardens that 
almost anyone ever saw! In this far northern 
country where there are months and months 
of night all in one long period of time, with 
7 
















8 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


no sun at all, and where it is so cold that the 
icicles on the eaves do not drip for eight 
months long! This doesn’t seem possible, 
to many of us. But it is true just the same, 
for Little Baby Laughing Loon saw them as 
she went for a walk on the hillside. It 
seems that when the sun did come out he 
must have felt sorry for the poor cold world 
and just as fast as he could spare the time 
he stayed longer and longer until at last 
he just didn’t go to bed at all, but just 
stayed around and warmed up the earth 
and melted the snow and had the flower beds 
all ready; and before one would ever think 
it possible there they were—thousands and 
thousands of flowers; red and blue and pink 
and crimson, tossing their heads merrily in 
the sunshine! There never was a wild prairie 
full of cowslips and buttercups, shooting 
stars and lady slippers, that could compare 
with it, nor was any deep wooded garden 
full of anemonies and spring beauties its 
equal. 




THE PUFFINS AND THE HUNTER 


9 


This day Baby Loon walked among them 
they had just washed their faces in a fresh 
cloud bank, and my! how finely they did 
nod their heads! 

“Good morning, good morning, every¬ 
body!” exclaimed Baby in bird talk, as she 
trudged along. “How are you all today?” 
She couldn’t call them all by name, for no 
white man had seen them all to give them 
names, and the Eskimo people use many 
names for their own children. Baby didn’t 
mind that. She just trotted along happily, 
while hundreds of Puffins whirled by just 
over her head, practicing a song for their 
next grand concert. 

While Baby Loon was among the flowers 
something strange happened on Happy 
Island that very day. The Puffin chorus 
were flying through the air having a fine 
time while they practiced the new chorus. 
If anyone on the hill above had been 
watching very, very closely they would have 
noticed that every now and then, as the 
Puffins skimmed along close to the ground, 





10 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


some of them closest to the ground stopped 
suddenly as if they had struck something. 
They seemed to flutter there for a moment 
and then all together, three or four, or as 
many as ten of them, would go flop! to 
the ground, and though they seemed to be 
struggling to rise, they didn’t leave the 
ground. Now, that would have looked very 
strange to the watcher. If he knew Little 
Baby Laughing Loon very well and had 
liked her as well as we would be certain 
to do, he would have hurried to her down 
there among the flowers and told her what 
he had seen and warned her not to go any 
farther. But the watcher was not there, so 
Little Baby Laughing Loon walked on and 
on, still nodding to the flowers and saying, 
“Good morning, good morning, everybody! 
How are you today?” Every now and then 
down would go more of the little Puffin 
folks, only to struggle and rise and to fall. 

So Baby marched sturdily on and on until 
at last she was quite above the flower beds 
and was thinking of going back, when Zing! 




THE PUFFINS AND THE HUNTER 


11 


something tumbled down on her head! It 
didn’t seem very heavy. Perhaps it was just 
a clump of flowers that had been blown 
there by the wind. That was the way Baby 
thought about it, and she wasn’t very much 
frightened at first; yet when she started to 
rise she found she couldn’t, for though the 
thing was not heavy, it seemed bound tight 
to the ground and she could not budge. 
Then she was frightened! She twisted her 
head about and looked around her. Right 
close to her was one of the gay little Puffin 
singers. He was bound to the earth, too. 

“Hello,” said Baby in bird talk. “What 
has happened to us?” 

“It’s Omnok, the Eskimo hunter’s terrible 
net!” exclaimed the little Puffin sadly. “I 
didn’t see it till it was too late. I ran right 
into it, and so did some of the others. It 
flopped right down upon us and here we 
are. By and by Omnok will come around 
and put us in a close, evil-smelling sack, 
and then tomorrow he will make food of 
us for his family. I suppose we shouldn’t 





12 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


blame him, for if he did not hunt and fish 
his family would starve, for this country 
will not raise corn and potatoes, wheat and 
sugar cane, as other lands. It will raise 
only flowers.” 

“Can’t we get away?” asked Baby hope¬ 
fully. “I’m going to try, anyway.” 

“You might just as well while you may,” 
said the little singer. “The net is very 
strong.” 

Indeed, Baby found this quite true, for 
it was made of fine threads of sealskin. She 
struggled and struggled toward the edge of 
the net, and at last she was one mesh nearer 
the edge. She kept struggling and again 
was two meshes nearer, then three, then 
four, and very soon she was very near the 
edge; right alongside, in fact. The outside 
strand of the net was very much larger than 
the others, and stretched very, very tight. 
Struggle as she might, she could not even 
so much as get her head under it. 

“It is too bad!” said the little singer. 






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14 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


But Baby Loon did not give up. She 
just lay there quite still, and when Omnok 
the hunter came along you might have 
thought she was a stone or a block of drift¬ 
wood. Omnok came closer and closer. 
Every now and then he lifted the net and 
took a Puffin from beneath it. Then he 
would come a little closer to Baby and stop 
again. He was getting very, very close. 
We can be sure that he hadn’t seen Baby 
or he wouldn’t have done as he did. For 
he lifted the net to take a Puffin out and 
raised it quite high for a second. A second 
was enough, for Zip! out whirled Baby 
Laughing Loon and away she flew like a 
streak. 

“Ah-ne-ca!” exclaimed Omnok. “I have 
lost the best one of all. She would have 
made me a good meal all by herself. I 
wonder how she came so close to the edge 
of the net?” Baby Laughing Loon knew 
how she came there and she was glad. She 
had done the best she could under the worst 
circumstances, but she was very, very sorry 
for her friends, the little Puffin singers. 




TOMMIE SPECKS, GRAY GEESE AND 
THE CRANE 


There was a great company of the young 
bird people gathered on the Happy Island 
beach that day. There was Little Baby 
Laughing Loon with her brother and sister; 
there were Tommie Specks and his sister 
of the Eider Duck family, and there were 
the six Gray Goose children who had re¬ 
cently come to the island. They had all 
played until they were quite tired out; then 
they had found a sheltered place between 
two rocks where the sun peeped warmly 
through, and where the sand was warm and 


16 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


dry. There they were having a very fine 
time drying themselves and brushing the 
sand off their feathers. 

Tommie Specks was making himself quite 
mean, as he often did, by strutting about 
and showing off his splendid bathing suit 
and his wonderful broad-rimmed glasses. 
“See! See!” he seemed to exclaim, as 
through his glasses he looked in an over- 
proud way at the newly arrived Gray Goose 
children. “Look! Look! What very plain¬ 
looking folks they are!” Now, of course, 
this made the other bird folks very much 
ashamed, for they liked the odd little 
strangers. As for the Goose children, they 
did not enjoy being made fun of. Then 
suddenly there marched in among them 
another stranger, who was to receive some 
of Tommie Speck’s joking comments. 

Tommie just stood and stared at the 
strange bird for a full moment before he 
was able to say a word. Such an odd bird 
this stranger was, anyway! He was almost 
as tall as the rocks beside which they were 




« 



Tommie just stood and stared. 


17 





















































































18 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


resting, and as for being slim, it was true 
there wasn’t a bird among them who was 
half as high as this stranger, for, of course, 
it is well known how plump young Duck 
folks and young Gray Goose folks are, and 
Little Baby Laughing Loon was of just the 
same kind. But as for this stranger—why, 
if they had known anything about living 
skeletons they would have called him that 
at the first glance. 

“Look!” exclaimed Tommie, but that was 
as far as he could go because of his aston¬ 
ishment. 

The .stranger was as awkward as he 
looked, every bit of it! When he stooped 
to get a better look at the other bird folks 
he really looked as if he might fall over; 
and to make matters more strange, he drew 
one of his long legs up under his ragged 
coat, which was not a bathing suit at all, 
but a kind of a great storm coat. They all 
thought he would surely fall over, but he 
didn’t. He just stood there on one foot and 




GRAY GEESE AND THE CRANE 


19 


swallowed his Adam’s apple one or two 
times, then he said: 

“My name’s Dannie Whooping Crane. 
Want to hear me whoop?’’ 

He didn’t wait for them to say yes or no, 
but just opened his mouth and gave six of 
the loudest whoops one ever heard: “Hoop! 
Hoop! Who-oop! Who-o-op! Who-oo-oop! 
Who-ooo-ooop!’’ 

“Well! Well!” exclaimed Tommie. His 
spectacles were on crosswise, but he was so 
excited that he did not know it. 

The stranger swallowed his Adam’s apple 
four more times, then he stood there awk¬ 
wardly as could be, and nobody seemed able 
to say one word. 

Just then another stranger came around 
the corner who was not half as welcome as 
Dannie Whooping Crane. A black, black 
nose, very sharp and very keen, was fol¬ 
lowed by two cruel eyes and some sharp 
and terrible teeth. Old Black Fox was 
standing grinning an ugly grin at all the 
little folks, and here they were shut in on 




20 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


all sides by the rocks except on the side 
where he stood! The birds did not know 
what to do. If they started to fly he would 
snap them up by the heels and toss them 
right over his back. If they tried to reach 
the ocean, right there he was ready to seize 
them by the neck! Here was a terrible 
situation, indeed! Tommie Specks didn’t 
seem to know any more what to do than 
the rest. Indeed, he tried to hide behind 
Little Baby Laughing Loon. Little Baby 
Laughing Loon and the new Goose children 
were afraid, but they stood right in their 
places and tried to act not a bit frightened. 

Dannie Whooping Crane hadn’t moved, 
either. He hadn’t even put his other foot 
on the ground. The one which was down 
didn’t tremble the least bit, either. For 
quite a while Black Fox didn’t seem to 
notice him. Perhaps he took his leg for a 
bit of driftwood sticking up in the sand. 
But when Dannie made a little gurgling 
sound in his throat, Black Fox looked up 
surprised, and when he saw who it was he 





Black Fox didn’t seem to notice him. 


21 















































































22 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


seemed more surprised than ever. Indeed, 
strange to tell, he seemed to remember that 
he had important business on some other 
part of the island, for he turned right about 
and trotted away! 

For two or three moments nobody said 
a word. At last Tommie Specks stepped 
out from behind Little Baby Laughing Loon, 
and, looking through his glasses, said, “Well, 
well, what were you all frightened at? You 
didn’t think he’d dare attack all of us at 
once? Not while I was around he wouldn’t.” 

But all the bird folks were looking up at 
Dannie Whooping Crane, who had not yet 
put his other foot down on the sand. He 
didn’t say a word, but just looked at some 
clams on a rock which the little bird folks 
had been trying to eat, but couldn’t, because 
their shells were too hard. Then he stooped 
over and gave a clam one crack with his 
long beak, and the clam burst right in two! 

Well! Well! What a strong beak!” ex¬ 
claimed Tommie Specks, edging toward the 




GRAY GEESE AND THE CRANE 


23 


water. In a moment he splashed into the 
sea and disappeared ’round the corner. 

Dannie Whooping Crane just looked and 
cracked another clam. He cracked them 
and cracked them till there were quite 
enough for the whole company; then he 
went stalking away over a sand pile. 

“A very fine fellow!” exclaimed one of 
the Gray Goose children. 

“Not a bit proud, though he is so strong!” 
said Tommie Specks’ sister, who was not 
pleased that day at her over-proud brother, 
and quite pleased with the actions of the 
tall young bird stranger. 

That night, as she slept, Little Baby 
Laughing Loon dreamed that she was a big 
Black Fox and that Dannie Whooping Crane 
was trying to peck her eyes out with his 
long, strong beak. 




MOTHER SPECKS’ NEST 


“Hurrah! The day’s just right for a 
swim!” cheered Tommy Specks, as he 
turned a somersault from a rock into the 
sea. Tommy was dressed in his bathing 
suit, and a wonderful bathing suit it was, 
too. It looked like the downy edge of a 
silvery cloud sewed to a bit of the deep blue 
sky. And his cap was more wonderful still 
—the deep blue of a sea cave and the golden 
green of the sunset. Astride his nose were 
the widest rimmed spectacles that ever a 
boy gloried in. It was these spectacles, 
worn by all the men of his family, which 
gave the Specks their name. For Tommy 
was the youngest son of Madam Specks of 
the Spectacled Eider Duck family. 

24 


MOTHER SPECKS’ NEST 


25 


“Yes/* Tommy’s mother agreed; “the day 
is just right, and you may take your sister 
for a romp on the waves.’’ 

Now, a romp on the waves on such a day 
was as much fun as a Fourth of July picnic, 
for there had been a great storm on the 
Arctic Sea and now the waves were rolling 
gloriously. Away scampered the children, 
and Mother Specks settled herself down on 
her nest for the day. 

Mother Specks, however, had been alone 
a very short time when she, too, became 
restless. There was no reason at all why 
she might not go for a little swim herself 
to catch a red-faced shrimp or two for her 
breakfast. Her eggs would not get cold, 
for had she not torn her heavy winter coat 
into little downy bits and covered her eggs 
deep, deep with it? And so, giving her 
nest a little tuck here and there, she glided 
down to the water’s edge and was soon 
enjoying a fine plunge. 

As Mother Specks made her third dive, 
who should come along but Miss Swan? 




26 THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 



Miss Swan had not yet gone to housekeep¬ 
ing. Her mother thought her too young 
for that. But she was very large, much 
larger than Mother Specks, and far too 
sedate and graceful to play with the smaller 
youngsters. 

“Good morning,” she said, bending her 
graceful neck in a stately bow. “How are 
your eggs?” 

“Doing nicely, indeed,” replied Mother 
Specks, bowing as gracefully as she could; 
“I have them well covered and am going 
for a bit of a swim.” 

“You won’t leave them long, will you?” 
inquired Miss Swan anxiously. “I beg your 











MOTHER SPECKS’ NEST 


27 


pardon—I recall now that the Family of 
Specks have a very deft way of covering 
your eggs. It is too bad that we have never 
learned it..’ 

“Oh, yes, they will do very well for an 
hour or so,” said Mother Specks, pleased at 
the compliment. “How is your mother?! 
As beautiful and graceful as ever?” 

So Mrs. Specks and Miss Swan were 
enjoying each other’s company very much 
when someone presently came in sight round 
the point. Indeed, it was no other than our 
old friend Little Red Fox! He and his 
mother had followed Big White Bear across 
the ice during the winter and had come over 
to Happy Island to live. The bird folks 
didn’t welcome them very heartily. 

Mother Specks watched Little Red Fox 
very sharply as he drew near her nest. 

“He looks like a very dangerous fellow,” 
said Miss Swan. “I shouldn’t wonder one 
bit if he were a meddlesome thief.” 




28 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


“Some of his folks are,” replied Mrs. 
Specks mildly, “but he is young. Let’s not 
judge him too harshly.” 

When Little Red Fox discovered that 
wonderful downy nest, he was delighted. 
Never before had he seen anything that 
looked so comfortable. He was tired, and 
here was the very place for a good rest. 
Ah-ha! when he touched the nest with the 
tip of his toe, how warm it felt! What a 
wonderful find it was. If he had not been 
so tired he might have smelled the eggs at 
once and got himself into trouble; but as it 
was, he just curled up in the nest in a little 
ball and in second was fast asleep. 

Mrs. Specks and Miss Swan had been 
watching him closely all this time. 

If I were you, I should go right up there 
and make him leave,” declared Miss Swan 
decidedly. 

Oh, I think that is hardly necessary,” 
said Mother Specks cheerfully. “He won’t 
do any harm, he’s such a little fellow; and 
besides,” she added, “if he keeps the eggs 




MOTHER SPECKS’ NEST 


29 


warm, I shan’t have to, and can stay for a 
longer swim.” 

Miss Swan said no more, but felt very 
much worried over the eggs. It nearly 
spoiled her visit, for in spite of herself she 
kept looking up to the place where Little 
Red Fox was sleeping on Mother Specks’ 
nest. 

‘‘Oh, Mrs. Specks!” she called at last. 

Little Red Fox, wakened very much re¬ 
freshed from his nap in the cozy nest, and 
the same mischievous Little Red Fox of 
old, had smelled the eggs under the fine 
covering and was tossing that splendid cov¬ 
ering to the winds fast as his nimble toes 
could fly! 

With wild screams, Mother Specks dashed 
through the water and up over the sand as 
fast as her trembling legs could carry her. 
Her screams, however, were as much lost on 
Little Red Fox as if he had been deaf. 
Mrs. Specks’ legs were trembling, not from 
fear, but from anger, as Little Red Fox 
found out soon enough. And as there isn t 




30 THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 



In a minute Little Red Fox was racing away. 


any one in the world who can box ears 
better than Mother Specks when she gets 
started, she made good work of it. In a 
minute Little Red Fox was racing away 
home, wondering if his head were really 
broken. 

Poor Mother Specks! She hurriedly gath¬ 
ered up all the pieces of her warm winter 
coat that she could find, but they had been 
blown far and wide, and most of them had 
tumbled into the sea and been carried away. 
There were hardly enough left to cover the 
eggs and not nearly enough to keep them 
really warm. 
















MOTHER SPECKS’ NEST 


31 


“Serves me right!” she sighed at last, as 
she settled down once more on her nest. “I 
should not have trusted someone else to do 
my work. Now I shall have to miss all my 
fine swims till these eggs are hatched, and 
like as ^ not I’ll go hungry many times 
besides.” 

Miss Swan, as she swam away, thought 
about Mrs. Specks’ disturbed nest. Then she 
sailed away quickly for home to see how 
her own patient mother was getting along 
with her housekeeping. 




THE TOMCOD FAMILY REUNION 



While Mother Specks was having her 
pleasant chat with Miss Swan and her dis¬ 
tressing experience with that young rascal, 
Little Red Fox, her children were having 
fun out on the great rolling sea, sliding 
down this wave and that one. 

Down in the valley, between two waves, 
they had discovered a little playmate. Miss 
Puffin was her name. She was a very plain 
little body, with a dull drab bathing suit 
and a very large nose, but she soon proved 


32 


THE TOMCOD FAMILY REUNION 


33 


to be as friendly as she was plain, and the 
three were having a joyous time coasting 
on the waves. 

“Listen!” said little Miss Puffin suddenly, 
as she reached the bottom of a wave. “I 
think I hear voices.” 

Miss Specks listened sharply. It might 
be the voices of Ivory Sea Gull and his pirate 
crowd, she thought. 

“Yes, I hear them, too,” she said, “many, 
many little voices. They must be down in 
the sea.” 

True enough, as they looked into the blue 
water, they saw hundreds of little people 
swimming about, all talking as loudly as 
they could, and all talking at once. It was 
the Tomcod family, gathered for a reunion. 

“Hush!” cautioned Miss Puffin. “They 
are talking about where they will hold their 
celebration.” 

They held their breath, listening, and this 
is what they heard: “I think under the 
great brown rock is the place.” 





34 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


“No, no, you’re wrong, all wrong! Over 
on the sand bar’s the place.” 

“No! No! What do you fellows know 
about it? Over in the seaweed grove’s the 
very place! There we have shade and plenty 
of sand grass.” 

“You’re all wrong—” and so on and on 
they went, all talking at once, just because 
they had no leader. 

“What a silly, foolish crowd they are!” 
said Miss Specks. “I feel sorry for them. 
People like that very often get into a great 
deal of trouble because they have no one 
to lead them.” 

The Tomcod reunion party soon drifted 
out of sight and the three friends went on 
with their play. They had just reached the 
crest of a splendid wave when the water 
suddenly turned dark, as if a cloud were 
passing over the sky. They looked up, but 
there wasn’t a cloud to be seen and they 
were wondering what had happened, when 
up spouted a great rush of water from the 




THE TOMCOD FAMILY REUNION 


35 



/ just had to sprout that water out. 


sea, tossing them high in the air and fright¬ 
ening them nearly out of their wits. 

“What’s that!’’ screamed Miss Specks in 
terror, as she tumbled back into the ocean 
with her bathing suit sadly mussed. 

“Pardon me!’’ came a great, heavy voice. 
There, with his head out of the water, was 
the biggest fish they had ever seen—the 
biggest, indeed, that anybody in all the world 
has even seen. “I didn’t mean to disturb 
you,” apologized Old Giant Whale. “But 
you see I just had to spout that water out, 
and I didn’t know you were there.” 




36 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


“Oh, I see,” said Miss Specks, with a sigh 
of relief; # “you had to breathe, so you came 
up and spouted all the air out of your lungs 
at once and that is what gave us such a 
tumble.” 

“That’s just where you’re wrong, and a 
lot of other people are wrong, too,” Old 
Giant Whale corrected her. “I don’t spout 
when I breathe. It is only when I need more 
room in my banquet hall that I spout the 
water out. Now, just a moment ago, for 
instance, the Tomcod family reunion party 
came along and were all mixed up about 
where they should hold their reunion. I 
just opened up the door to my banquet hall 
and said, ‘Please, folks, won’t you step 
inside?’ and inside they stepped. Then, of 
course, I had to spout out the water so 
there’d be room for them all.” 

“My!” said Miss Specks, after a moment’s 
thought, “I think I’d rather not go to a 
reunion in your banquet hall!” 

“There isn’t much danger of it,” Old 
Giant Whale reassured her, with a ponderous 




THE TOMCOD FAMILY REUNION 


37 


wink of his oily eye. “Folks with good 
parents and advisers seldom rent it, and I 
am told you have a very wise mother.” 

You re quite right—she’s a very wise 
mother, indeed, said Miss Specks proudly, 
and I must be going back to her very soon, 
for it is nearly time for lunch.” 

With that, Miss Specks returned to her 
friends for one more good romp. She could 
not help thinking, however, of the unfortu¬ 
nate plight of the Tomcod reunion party, 
and wondering whether Old Giant Whale 
would ever open the door of his banquet 
hall and let them out. Somehow she felt 
quite sure that he never would. 





TOMMY DISCOVERS OLD SEA 
SERPENT 



After Old Giant Whale disappeared under 
the water, Miss Specks and her brother 
Tommy and their friend Miss Puffin invented 
a new game. It was called “dive deeper 
than you can.” Miss Puffin couldn’t play 
it nearly as well as the other two, for they 
were the most skillful divers among all the 
families who had their homes on Happy 
Island. But she Was a cheerful body and 
did the best she could. She seemed to enjoy 
the sport quite as much as her friends. 

38 










TOMMY DISCOVERS OLD SEA SERPENT 39 


Tommy could dive straight down and pick 
up a shrimp twenty feet below the surface 
of the water, and his sister could do almost 
as well, sometimes quite as well, so among 
them they had a great time. 

As the two young ladies were preparing 
for their final dive before going home, one 
which they were quite sure was going to be 
the very best yet, Tommy’s eyes seemed 
suddenly to pop out of his head, and with 
a gulp he cried, “Old Sea Serpent!” diving 
with a mighty splash. 

“Sea Serpent!” echoed Miss Specks, fol¬ 
lowing him. 

“Sea Serpent,” murmured Miss Puffin, 
almost too scared to move, but diving after 
them at last. 

It is told that of all the folks that are sup¬ 
posed to live in the great, broad ocean. Old 
Sea Serpent is the most to be feared. Old 
Giant Whale, who can turn a boat upside 
down in a jiffy; Tusks the Walrus, who can 
tear up a boat with his great powerful 




40 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


tusks; Mr. Shark, with his rows and rows 
of terrible teeth—none of these is so terrible 
as Old Sea Serpent. Nobody has ever really 
caught any member of Old Sea Serpent’s fam¬ 
ily, but many and many a seaman sailing 
the silent sea, has declared he has caught 
sight of him, and we may feel certain it 
is just because he has never been caught 
that Old Sea Serpent seems so terrible. All 
the little sea folk are as much afraid of him 
as sailors are, and the hearts of our three 
young bird friends were beating very, very 
fast at the thought of meeting this dreadful 
monster face to face. True, no one but 
Tommy had seen him, but Tommy had 
looked so scared that the others had never 
thought of doubting that he had actually 
glimpsed the sea fellow. 

They couldn’t stay under water very long, 
however, for the sea bird folk can’t hold their 
breath nearly so long as Little Brown Seal or 
Tusks the Walrus. And of course they 
couldn’t talk, either. They could only make 
signs and talk with their eyes. As soon as 




TOMMY DISCOVERS OLD SEA SERPENT 41 


Miss Specks had recovered a little from her 
fright she began to doubt whether, after all. 
Old Sea Serpent really was about. Presently 
she said with her eyes, “I’m going to get my 
breath and see if he is really there.” 

Up she went. And down she came again 
with only half a breath of air, her eyes bulg¬ 
ing just as Tommy’s had done and saying 
much more plainly than words: “Yes indeed! 
It is Old Sea Serpent, his very own self!” 

What were those three timid little people 
to do? There they were, down under the 
sea and not able to breathe at all, and yet 
afraid of their lives up where there was plenty 
of air! But Little Miss Puffin was a very 
strong hearted young person, so she finally 
decided to go up and see for herself. Back 
she came, too, with the very same story to 
tell. 

“Yes indeed!” she said in the sign language, 
“I saw him too. There were his great, white 
fearful fangs and his awful mouth; and there 
was one hump, two humps, three humps on 
his back, and then there was his awful tail.” 




42 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


By this time they just had to have some 
air, so they decided to all go to the surface 
together. If they had to be eaten, they might 
as well be eaten all at once. So up the three 
went, and down they dove again, just as 
frightened as ever. 

“Did you see him?” Miss Specks signaled. 

“Yes, indeed!” said Tommy. “And there 
were four humps on his back!” 

“Four humps!” signaled Miss Puffin. “I 
saw only three.” 

“You’re both wrong!” signaled Miss 
Specks. “There were five!” 

“No,” Tommy signaled emphatically, 
“only four!” 

Tommy didn’t settle the matter, however, 
not certain, for Miss Specks was sure there 
were five humps and Miss Puffin was equally 
sure there were only three. Miss Puffin, 
plain and timid as she was, could be very 
positive when she felt sure she was right. 

About that time a strange thing happened. 
When the three little comrades began to ar- 




TOMMY DISCOVERS OLD SEA SERPENT 43 


gue about the number of humps they forgot 
all about their fright and decided to go up 
and find out who was right. So up they 
came, each determined to stay long enough 
to see for himself, and stay up they did, 
though they were afraid. 

“There, I knew I was right—there are 
three!” cried Miss Puffin. 

“There, I am right—there are four!” 
chimed in Tommy. 

“You’re both wrong, there are five!” 
shrieked Miss Specks. 

Then all three began to look and look; then 
they began to laugh, and they laughed, and 
laughed, and laughed. For Old Sea Serpent 
was just Tusks the Walrus and his four 
brothers playing sea serpent. Tusks, you 
see, would stand on his hind feet in the 
water and poke his head out, looking very 
fierce. At the same time his oldest brother 
would dive head first and leave just the bend 
of his body above the water to make one of 
the humps, the next three brothers made the 




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TOMMY DISCOVERS OLD SEA SERPENT 45 


other humps and the little brother diving and 
leaving his hind feet sticking out of the water 
close together, made the tail. 

That was the terrible Old Sea Serpent 
which had so frightened our little friends, 
and is probably the only sea serpent that 
the sailors and the little folks of the sea have 
ever seen. 

Miss Specks and Tommy and Miss Puffin 
were not angry with Tusks and his brothers, 
for though they had been frightened, they 
were very good natured, and they knew 
enough to take a joke. So the day being fine, 
they stayed and watched the antics of the 
big black brothers and admired their deep 
sea diving till the waves began to cast long, 
long shadows and they knew it was time for 
all young Bird people to hurry home. 





BABY LAUGHING LOON STRAYS 
AWAY 



Over on one corner of Happy Island, where 
the Specks family lived, there was a strange 
little hallway, long and narrow and all roofed 
over with grass and rushes. Mrs. Laughing 
Loon, who had built it, sat gazing down the 
narrow hallway to the edge of the sea, and 
smiling contentedly. Her nest was snug and 
safe, and every day she could slip down to 
the water for a bit of a swim. 

In a day or two some downy little folks 
would follow Mrs. Laughing Loon down that 
lane, to plunge with her into the sea. No 
wonder her heart was glad. Already under 
one wing she felt the movements of another 


46 


BABY LAUGHING LOON STRAYS AWAY 47 


baby Laughing Loon, and she felt sure there 
would be two more babies soon. But the 
day was warm for a world usually so cold, 
and in her cozy retreat she grew very drowsy. 
Her head nodded and nodded until it 
seemed as if her beautiful green cap must 
tumble off. Her graceful neck in its glis¬ 
tening collar bent, bent, and at last Mrs. 
Laughing Loon was fast asleep. 

From under Mrs. Laughing Loon’s wing 
there appeared a tiny head covered with a 
fuzzy-wuzzy, woolly-cotton hood. Baby 
Laughing Loon was taking her first look at 
the world. She thought it was a very long 
world indeed and a very narrow one, for 
all she could see was the long hallway. Pre¬ 
sently she crept out a little farther and again 
looked about. There seemed to be some¬ 
thing at the other end of the hallway, some¬ 
thing that murmured, murmured, murmured, 
and kept going “Swish, swish, swish!” She 
wondered what it was. Her mother was still 
asleep. She tried her legs and found they 
would hold her up and carry her about. She 




48 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


slipped from under her mother’s breast and 
went wandering down the hallway. 

Suddenly she saw a sharp pink nose poke 
its way through the wall and two pink eyes 
looked at her very sharply. Presently two 
white feet followed the pink nose and the 
pink eyes. Of course they belonged to our old 
friend, Little White Fox. That young scamp 
with his sharp nose and his twinkling eyes, 
was between Baby Laughing Loon, and her 
mother. What should she do? There was 
only one thing to do, and she did it at once: 
she ran to the end of the hallway and tumbled 
into the sea. 

Now Baby Laughing Loon didn’t know one 
thing about swimming, but somehow she 
found herself right side up in a moment, and 
in smother second her feet were going swish, 
swish! through the water, just as if she had 
been swimming for ages and ages. And her 
fuzzy-wuzzy, woolly-cotton bathing suit kept 
her perfectly dry! 

Of course Mrs. Laughing Loon had 
wakened by this time and missed her baby, 




BABY LAUGHING LOON STRAYS AWAY 49 


and her heart was filled with worry for her 
baby bird. What could she do? Here were 
two other little folks just ready to break out 
of their shells, and if she left them to look 
for her wandering child they would become 
chilled and die. 

Out on the ocean, which seemed to grow 
broader and broader every moment, little 
Baby Laughing Loon was growing very, very 
lonesome indeed. She longed for her mother 
and yes, that surely was her mother, just 
over the third wave, and coming nearer. 
“How large she is,” thought Baby Laughing 
Loon in surprise. Then to her dismay this 
big mother began going away from her, and 
Baby Laughing Loon followed fast, as fast 
as ever she could. 

“What a strange foot my mother has!” she 
said to herself as she hurried along. “First 
she puts it out on one side of her and kicks, 
kicks, kicks, then she puts it out on the other 
side of her and kicks, kicks kicks. I am quite 
sure my feet do not go like that. 




50 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Just then this big mother turned her head 
and smiled at her and it was such a kind 
smile that Baby Laughing Loon was con¬ 
vinced that it really must be her mother. She 
was beginning to feel comfortable and sure 
that she would soon be once more under her 
mother’s breast, when very close to land this 
mother came right in two in the middle! 
Half of her stayed in one place and the other 
half went wandering around in the water. 
Then the half that had been closest to the 
water was picked up by the other half and 
carried right to the land. 

Baby Laughing Loon could hardly believe 
her eyes, and no wonder, for this remarkable 
“mother” was Kituk, the Eskimo boy. He 
had been paddling in his kiak boat, and it 
was his paddle that Baby Laughing Loon 
had thought was her mother’s foot. He got 
out of his kiak and carried it to shore. Then 
he looked at Baby Laughing Loon and 
laughed at her for following him. 




BABY LAUGHING LOON STRAYS AWAY 51 



Began to paddle away. 


“Well,” he said, “1 think I know what to 
do with you—I’ll just lead you back to Happy 
Island.” 

He climbed into hie kiak and began to 
paddle away, and sure enough, Baby Laugh¬ 
ing Loon once more thought he was her 
mother and went swimming after him. 

Soon they were at Happy Island, and there 
oh, joy! Baby Laughing Loon knew at last 
that this big thing was not her mother, for 
over there in a little quiet place was her very 
own mother, swimming round, and right by 
her side two little folks dressed all in fuzzy- 
wuzzy, woolly-cotton bathing suits. 

When the mother saw her lost baby and 
Kituk, how she did scream to her! And 
how fast they all did paddle away! 






52 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


“They needn’t be so frightened,” said 
Kituk with a smile. “I wouldn’t hurt them.” 

Mrs. Laughing Loon had had sad experi¬ 
ences with some of Kituk’s relatives, and she 
cautioned her little daughter never, never to 
run away again. 





PIRATES SPOIL THE PUFFIN CONCERT 



The day was a glorious one for romping 
on the sea. Fluffy white clouds whisked 
across the blue sky, and the sea was even 
bluer than the sky, while everywhere little 
waves whispered, “Come in! Come in! Come 
in!” 

Little Baby Laughing Loon was happy as 
could be. She was all dressed up in her 
fuzzy- wuzzy, woolly-cotton bathing suit and 
was going to a wonderful concert. This time 


53 












54 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


she wasn’t going to become lost. Her mother 
and her two little brothers were going with 
her to the concert, to hear Signor Puffin, a 
cousin of Little Miss Puffin, sing, assisted by 
all the choirs of Puffin folk on Happy Island. 
And there were many, many choirs of them, 
too. 

“Come on,*’’ called Mrs. Laughing Loon, 
giving her splendid polka dot silk bathing suit 
a pat here and there. We perhaps think 
it strange that people should attend a concert 
in bathing suits, but a bathing suit is quite 
the proper costume for the bird folks on 
Happy Island. 

Such a concert as that was! The singers 
didn’t just gather on a platform, as we do 
at our concerts. Some of them did, to be 
sure, gather on the cliffs of Happy island, 
but that was only a part of the chorus. A 
great, great many more were floating out on 
the blue sea, and still others were flying con¬ 
stantly about in the air. The words of the 
chorus, you see, were all about how the 
earth, the sky and sea all belonged to the 




PIRATES SPOIL THE PUFFIN CONCERT 55 


Puffin folk, and so they sang their choruses 
from earth, sky and sea. 

How those Puffin folk did sing! First 
those on the cliffs sang— 

“The earth, the sea, the air's our home; 

Walking, swimming, flying, it’s our own.” 

Those floating about on the sea answered 
back— 

“Earth or air or the deep blue sea, 

Dipping, diving, soaring free.” 

Then those soaring in the air took up the 
chorus— 

“We’re always happy! Soaring high. 

Far above the sea we fly.” 

Then all rose in the air and joining in 
one grand chorus sang it all through again. 
What a wonderful thing it was! What a 
notable occasion it would have been if some¬ 
thing unusual hadn’t happened! It wasn t 
Baby Laughing Loon’s fault this time. No, 
indeed, it wasn’t at all. The other children 
were so much interested and wanted to get 
so close to the singers in the water that Mrs. 




56 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Laughing Loon was at her wit’s end to keep 
them from getting right into the singers’ 
seats. And that would never have done at 
all, for they couldn’t sing a note. But Baby 
Laughing Loon had stayed right where her 
mother told her to. Her mother, however, 
had gone on and on, following the other too 
eager bird children beyond this wave and 
that, until poor Baby Laughing Loon was left 
quite out of her sight. 

Suddenly the music stopped. There was 
a shrill scream, and in a moment all the 
Puffins were crying, “Pirates! Pirates!” 

“Pirates! Pirates! Run! Run!” came 

from land. 

“Pirates! Pirates! Swim! Swim!” 
sounded from the sea. 

“Pirates! Pirates! Fly! Fly!” was 

echoed in the air. 

All was confusion and noise, and in the 
midst of the commotion somewhere, alone, 
was Baby Laughing Loon. 

Perhaps we believe that there are no longer 
pirates on the sea, but that is a mistake. 





Pirates there certainly were. 


There are as many pirates in the bird land 
of the sea as there ever were, and very dan¬ 
gerous, fierce fellows they are, too! Their 
wings are their sails, their bosoms are their 
boats, and they still sail the broad, blue sea. 

Pirates there certainly were, too, in Baby 
Laughing Loon’s world at that very moment. 
While all the Puffin folk were flying and 
swimming away to hide in their homes under 
the rocks the poor child was looking up in 
terror at two fierce pirates soaring overhead. 
How she wished her mother would come! 
But mother didn’t, so all the child could do 
was to scurry off on the waves as fast as 




















58 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


her little legs would carry her, while those 
terrible pirates, Ivory Gull and Kittle Wake, 
came closer and closer. How fierce they 
looked! And how hideously they did crack 
their bills! 

Poor little Baby Laughing Loon! Paddle 
fast as she might, the two bold, fierce fel¬ 
lows came nearer and nearer. Now Baby 
Laughing Loon could hear the whirr of their 
wings, now see the gleam of their eyes. 
Now she could see every feather in their 
great sails. In one moment she would be 
carried away by the heartless pirates. And 
sure enough, suddenly Kittle Wake picked 
her up by her collar and whirled her away 
faster than she had ever traveled in her 
life before. It may seem strange that. her 
fuzzy-wuzzy, woolly-cotton suit didn’t tear 
right in two, but it didn’t, for it was a very 
strong bathing suit. On and on they whirled. 
Would she never see her mother and brothers 
again in their cozy home on Happy Island? 

Even pirates, however, fail sometimes to 
agree. For that matter, they seldom do 




PIRATES SPOIL THE PUFFIN CONCERT 59 



agree, and it wasn’t long before Baby Laugh¬ 
ing Loon became convinced that Kittle Wake 
was trying to get away from Ivory Gull. 
Which was exactly what he was doing. He 
was making very bad work of it, too, for 
he was much smaller than his companion, 
and besides, he had Baby Laughing Loon to 
carry. For a long time they had been far 
up in the air, so far it made Baby Laughing 
Loon dizzy to look down at the blue sea. 
But now they sank, sank, lower and lower, 
till her feet almost touched the tips of the 
highest waves. Then a strange thing hap- 






















60 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


pened. She felt Kittle Wake let go, and 
she dropped. The instant her feet touched 
the water, she dived! Dived deep! And 
it may be that Ivory Gull didn’t even know 
she was gone, for he went right on chasing 
Kittle Wake. 

Probably no one will ever know whether 
Kittle Wake had begun to feel sorry for 
Baby Laughing Loon and had dropped her 
on that account, or whether he thought he 
would come back and find her after Ivory 
Gull was gone. But however it was, he 
didn’t find her, for she began to swim with 
might and main for Happy Island, and she 
reached home just as her mother, who had 
given her up for lost, was preparing a sup¬ 
per of shrimps for the other bird children. 

It was a happy family that sat down to 
eat that night, you may be sure. And we 
may also be sure of another thing—that 
Mrs. Laughing Loon never tried to take her 
whole family to another grand concert un¬ 
less Papa Laughing Loon went along to 
help look after the younger children. 




LITTLE BABY LAUGHING LOON 
LEARNS TO PLAY SUBMARINE 


Over on the corner of Happy Island lived 
j Little Baby Laughing Loon and her mother. 

From this corner a long white sandbar ran 
I right out into the sea. Not far away was 
I a great black cliff, from the edge of which 
one could look down into the deepest, most 
mysterious sea cave ever seen. 

Little Baby Laughing Loon had one 
j brother and one sister—that is, these were 
| all the younger children. There were older 
) brothers and sisters, but they had taken 
mates of their own and gone to other parts 
of the Island to live. Baby’s mother liked 
best of all to be with her eldest of the three 
younger children, Little Baby Laughing 
61 




62 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Loon. Perhaps it was because Baby had 
peeped out from beneath Mrs. Laughing 
Loon’s heavy bathing suit first of all, and 
perhaps it was because the very first thing 
she had ever done was to become lost from 
her mother, and narrowly escape a sudden 
death. However that may have been, Mrs. 
Laughing Loon always found time out of 
each busy day to teach Baby some new thing 
about the sand bar, the ocean, or the tundra. 

“Today,” she said, as she smoothed Baby’s 
fuzzy-wuzzy, wooly-cotton bathing suit out 
very carefully, “today you must learn to 
play submarine.” 

“Play submarine?” exclaimed Little Baby 
Laughing Loon, as she frolicked with joy at 
the thought of some new game to be learned, 
“How do you play submarine”? 

“Not so fast,” warned the mother, as 
Baby tumbled head over heels down a sand 
bank. “You’ll have to go to the ocean to 
learn to play submarine, and though it is 
a very fine game it is a hard one to learn 




BABY LOON LEARNS TO PLAY SUBMARINE 63 


and only the Laughing Loon family have 
ever learned to play it well. It’s a very good 
game to know, too, for it has saved many 
a Laughing Loon’s life, I assure you.” 

Baby became quiet at these words, but 
she was still very anxious to learn the new 
game, and trotted along eagerly by her 
mother’s side till they reached the water’s 
edge. 

“You stay here and watch me .very 
closely,” said Mrs. Laughing Loon as she 
went splashing away in the sea. 

Baby watched her very closely as she 
went sailing grandly away to deep water. 
Then all of a sudden she rubbed her eyes 
and looked hard. She looked again and 
again. Her mother had disappeared! What 
could have happened? Had some great sea 
monster come along and seized her? Where 
could she be? 

Just when Baby was about to give up 
for lost and was planning to hasten home to 
tell her poor little brother and sister, her 








64 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


mother suddenly appeared in the water al¬ 
most under her very nose. “Did you lose 
me?” asked Mrs. Laughing Loon, smiling 
gaily. “Well, now, this time you watch 
very closely, very closely indeed, and per¬ 
haps you will see me all the time.” 

She went sailing away as before, and dis¬ 
appeared as before, but look here and there, 
everywhere on the ocean, Baby could not 
see her till she appeared as before, very close 
to shore. “Well, I do declare!” exclaimed 
her mother, “I thought you had very sharp 
eyes, but here you have lost me again! This ; 
time I will do it very, very slowly, and you 1 
watch very sharply.” 

She swam out into the water again, and 
this time as Baby watched she saw the ! 
very least bit of her mother’s bathing suit j 
seeming to float like a bit of sea grass on 
the water, and just before it, was the tip 
of her mother’s nose. That was all she 
could see. “Now I understand!” she ex¬ 
claimed, as her mother came to shore, “You 
just pull yourself down in the water and 






BABY LOON LEARNS TO PLAY SUBMARINE 65 



‘7 can do that! That's easy!" 


swim away, don’t you? I can do that! 
That’s easy!” 

“Oh! is it?” exclaimed Mrs. Laughing 
Loon, opening her eyes wide and looking 
very much surprised. “Well, then, suppose 
you try it, and I will see if I can find you.” 

Baby was all too willing to try it, and 
away she went out to deep water. She was 
very certain she knew how it was done, 
but when she tried it, to her surprise! she 


































66 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


couldn’t make herself sink at all. She held 
her breath until she could no longer do so. 
She put her head down into the water, but 
then her feet stuck up. She tried every way 
she knew, but at last she had to give it 
up and come back to shore. 

“Not so easy, is it?” laughed her mother 
good-naturedly. “Didn’t I tell you that the 
Loon family were almost the only people 
in the world who could do it well? Come 
out with me and I will show you how it is 
done, but you will have to practice many, 
many times before you can do it really well.” 

Baby was eager to take her first lesson, 
so away they splashed. She worked hard 
and learned much that first day. We may 
be certain she was ready for a good supper 
of shrimp and clam chowder when night 
came. She was happy, as everyone has a 
right to be when he is learning some new 
thing and doing their very best at it. 

It was not many days before Baby could 
play submarine almost as well as her mother. 
Then such good times as they did have try- 




BABY LOON LEARNS TO PLAY SUBMARINE 67 


ing to discover one another as they went 
scooting through the water! Then the day 
at last came when this knowledge gave Baby 
very good help though she did not know 
it was going to. Her mother had been so 
happy teaching her that she had forgotten 
to tell her why her people really learned to 
play submarine. 

Baby had been for a long trip out on the 
ocean when once more she heard that fear¬ 
ful cry, “Pirates! Pirates! Fly! Fly!” But 
Baby hadn’t learned to fly. What could she 
do? In just a moment she heard that dread¬ 
ful flap, flap of wings just over her head. 
She had escaped from the pirates once, but 
this time if they took her she felt very sure 
there would be no Little Baby Laughing 
Loon. She resolved to do her very best, so 
bravely she struck out for the shore. It wasn’t 
going to be a bit of use, she was certain, for 
the pirates—there were four of them this 
time—were soaring closer, closer to her. Sud¬ 
denly she saw her mother on the shore. She 
was screaming at the top of her voice, but 








68 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Baby could not hear a word she said. Her 
heart was beating so loudly and her feet 
made such a splashing as she paddled her 
best that the sound was quite drowned. Dare 
she stop for a second to listen? It was an 
only hope! Just one brief second she paused, 
then clearly across the waters came: 

“Play submarine! Play submarine!” 

For just a second Baby was puzzled, then 
she understood and instantly she disappeared 
as completely as if she had been swallowed 
by old Giant Whale. In vain the pirates 
skimmed along the water in search of her. 
They did not find her. But when at last 
they had given up the search Baby appeared 
on the water quite close to her mother’s side. 

Mrs. Laughing Loon kissed her a hundred 
times or more, and exclaimed, “I should have 
told you before! I should have told you 
before! But now you know what a valuable 
thing it is to be able to play submarine. 
Having learned it by this experience you 
will not forget it half so soon as you might 




BABY LOON LEARNS TO PLAY SUBMARINE 69 



have if I had told you of it in the first place. 
Now come home, we will have a cold bite 
and some muckluck grass tea, and away 
they splashed for the shore. 



















































PHILANDER GRAY GOOSE AND 
DUNGEMESS CRAB 


Over in another corner of the island lived j 
Mother Gray Goose and her five Gray Goose 
children. The Gray Goose children were 
dressed in woolly cotton bathing suits just as 
Baby Laughing Loon was. Every day, after 
she had taken her afternoon nap, their mother 
took them down to the ocean for a swim 
and caught red shrimps for them to eat. 
Now these young Goose children were very j 
impatient little fellows, as many young peo¬ 
ple are. Sometimes, almost always, in fact, 
they thought her nap lasted a long time. 
They didn’t dare to wake her. My! No! 




GRAY GOOSE AND DUNGEMESS CRAB 71 



Those naps seemed very long indeed. 


Philander, the largest of them all, and the 
one who always acted as their leader, tried 
that once, and after what happened to him 
then, he never cared to try it again. 

But for all that, those naps seemed very 
long indeed, and the little Goose folks grew 
more and more impatient about them, until 
one day Philander said to his brothers and 
sisters, “I’ll tell you what we will do. We’ll 
just go down to the ocean and hunt our din¬ 
ner for ourselves. We will get back in time to 
be here when mother wakes up, and then 
won’t she be surprised when she finds some 









72 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


shrimps and we say we don’t feel hungry?” 

Away they went then all in a straight row 
right down to the water, and in they plunged. 
They looked down into the water this way 
and that way very sharply, and very soon 
one of the youngsters spied a red-faced 
shrimp right down in the bottom on the sand, 
and down he bobbed, and up he came with 
the shrimp twisting in his bill. They all 
hurried over to the sand to feast on the 
shrimp. It was but a mouthful, however, 
and only made them more eager than ever 
to go hunting again. Out they swam, and 
they looked and looked and looked, but 
never another shrimp did they find. Pretty 
soon Philander said, “I see something brown 
sticking out of the sand!” 

“What is it? What is it?” the others all 
called in a chorus. 

“I’ll go down and see,” said Philander. 
Down he dove, and up he came with nothing 
in his mouth. 

“What was it? What was it?” the others 
demanded. 




GRAY GOOSE AND DUNGEMESS CRAB 


73 


“It’s a young clam, a very young clam,” 

I said Philander, “and he has his shell open. 

i I wonder, -” he hesitated, “I do wonder 

! if I dare put my bill in his shell and bring 
him up.” 

“O yes, you’d dare,” exclaimed one of 
the other Goose children. “Let me. I’d 
dare.” 

“No, no,” said Philander. “I’ll do it,” and 
down to the sand he dove again. Up he 
came again very quickly with the clam 
closely closed over his bill. Now we may 
think that he had a bad time getting that 
clam off his bill. But he didn’t. He wasn’t 
a bit worried. He just marched over to 
the shore, and when they were all gathered 
there, he gave a big yawn, and the clam shell 
i just fell right in two in the middle, and the 
five Goose children gobbled up the soft juicy 
clam in mouthfuls. 

But that wasn’t all of the story. They 
felt very good and very brave after that, 
and Philander thought it was time they had 
a grand march out on the ocean, and sang 







74 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


a song. So out they went, and round and 
round they swam, singing. 

“Rimp! Dimp! 

Caught a young clam and a shrimp! 

Rimp! Dimp! 

If we were lame we would limp! 

Rimpety, dimpety, dimp-dimp!” 

We may think that this was about as queer 
a song as one could sing. But it just suited 
them, for they were very young fellows, and 
liked things that were queer, as many young¬ 
sters do. 

Just about that time old Mrs. Goose 
wakened, very much refreshed from her nap. 
But where were the children? With a start 
of surprise she rubbed her eyes and looked 
about. In just an instant she saw them out 
on the ocean, and in the next instant she 
was racing down the beach, calling at the 
top of her voice. Mrs. Goose had seen some¬ 
thing over there on the sand bar right beneath 
the water where her youngsters were playing 
gaily about and singing, 




GRAY GOOSE AND DUNGEMESS CRAB 


75 


“Rimp! Dimp! 

Caught a young clam and a shrimp!” 

What she saw would have looked to us 
very much like a rock with several sticks 
piled about on top of it, but it didn’t look 
a bit like that to Mrs. Goose. She was far 
too wise a mother goose for that, so she went 
racing down the beach calling to her children 
as loudly as she could. 

But it often happens that many youngsters 
are so very much interested in what they 
are playing, and making so much noise about 
it that they cannot hear their mother’s voice. 
It was just so this time. The Gray Goose 
children just went right on singing, 

“Rimp! Dimp! 

Caught a young clam and a shrimp!” 
and never hear at all. And in just a moment 
they were right over that strange rock and 
those sticks. They didn’t see them at all, 
but went swimming right ahead. 

Now, old Dungemess Crab was usually 
content to dine of something much less fine 






76 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


than juicy young goose, 
but when he saw five pairs 
of fresh red feet hanging 
right down toward him, 
he just couldn’t resist the 
temptation to straighten 
out one of those hard, 
bony arms and open one 
of those hard, bony hands, 
and close up a pair of 
hard, bony fingers, so just 
as Philander Goose was 
singing his verse for the 
forty-ninth time, he gave a 
little startled scream, then 
a wild “Mother! Mother!” 
and with a little cough and 
a gurgle disappeared be¬ 
neath the water. 

Mother Goose saw it 
all, and was right out 
there in an instant. She 
went under the water with 
one plunge and very soon 
the water was all stirred 
































GRAY GOOSE AND DUNGEMESS CRAB 


77 


up. Then she and Philander appeared at the 
top safe and sound. 

Philander Goose didn’t sing that new song 
of his for a long time after that, for to tell 
the truth, he was very lame. After awhile 
he was able to get about again as well as 
ever, but after this adventure he always 
waited patiently for his mother to finish her 
naps before he ventured forth on the sea. 





STATELY MISS SWAN 



“My mother says a happy childhood 
brings a cheerful old age,” exclaimed Tom¬ 
mie Specks, standing on his head in the 
water and kicking his feet in the air, “and 
I want a cheerful old age, so I’m going to 
have a cheerful time right now.” He went 
racing through the water, waving his arm 
and screaming at the top of his voice. 

Stately Miss Swan looked at him doubt- 


78 



STATELY MISS SWAN 


79 


fully. “Do you think that’s really true?” 
she asked. 

“Of course it is!” exclaimed Tommie, turn¬ 
ing a hand spring. “Why, of course it is. 
My mother says it is and she heard it from 
some great human who was a scholar, so 
it must be true.” 

“And do you have to stand on your head 
and run and scream and do all those things 
to be cheerful?” 

“Of course you do,” said Tommie scorn¬ 
fully, “else how could people know how 
cheerful you are?” 

Miss Swan was puzzled. She wanted a 
cheerful old age just as badly as anyone, 
but all her life long she had been very, very 
quiet and dignified. Her mother had taught 
her that this was the way young Bird ladies 
should act. No where was Tommie Specks 
standing on his head, turning handsprings 
and screaming at the top of his voice and 
telling her that if she didn’t do those things 
she couldn’t have a cheerful old age! Why, 




80 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


she just felt bad all over at the thought of 
it right now! 

She went off in a corner all by herself and 
began to think. She was sure she would 
look very absurd standing on her head or 
turning hand springs in the water. Oh! no, 
she could never, never do that! But,— 
but, her mother had said once that their 
family were sometimes known as trumpeters 
and enjoyed the reputation of being the 
greatest trumpeters in the world. She just 
wondered if she could be one too. She 
swam away and away from the other Bird 
children till she was quite by herself in a 
little cove of the sea. There she puckered 
up her face and uttered a little tiny note. 
Oh, it was ever so tiny! But she did have 
to admit it sounded rather fine, so she tried 
it again, this time a little louder. Ah! yes, 
she could trumpet! She could indeed! And 
now she would have a cheerful old age, for 
she would practice over and over again, and 
very soon she would come marching out 




STATELY MISS SWAN 


81 


among her playmates trumpeting so loudly 
and so joyously that they would all cheer, 
“Miss Swan’s going to have a cheerful old 
age!’’ 

For several days after that, she spent every 
morning all by herself learning to trumpet, 
until at last she felt quite sure she was ready 
to trumpet before a king. 

The next morning out she swam trumpet¬ 
ing at every bend of her graceful neck and 
every stroke of her dainty foot. How the 
Birdie children did look! Tommie Specks 
stopped turning hand springs and stared, 
while Little Baby Laughing Loon forgot all 
about playing submarine and stared too. In 
just a moment Tommie thought of just the 
right thing to do. He turned right in behind 
Miss Specks and in just a second there was 
a whole procession of little folks swimming 
round and round, led by Miss Swan trumpet¬ 
ing her very best. We may be certain that 
it was one jolly time, and it seemed true 
that there was not a little fellow in the 
group but was to have a cheerful old age,— 




82 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 



This was their song. 

Oh, a very cheerful one, indeed! This was 
their song: 

Hi Away! Hi Away! Whoo-hoop away 
home! 

All the bright night and day; 

Dark will soon come to stay 
Hi away on. 

Now some dashing wave, 

Now some deep sea cave 
Echoes our song. 

Now round a crest we go 
East way or west we know, 

Soon again southward though. 

That won't be long. 

Oh! Happy Island dear! 

Soon only you'll be here. 

Sleeping alone. 








STATELY MISS SWAN 


83 


Sleep then our northern isle 
Neath moon's sweet silver smile, 

Sleep, Island, sleep! 

Wake then when spring has come. 

Shake off the ice our home. 

Wake, Island, wake! 

Then it's Hi Away! Hi Away! Whoo-hoop 
away home! 

All the bright night and day; 

Dark mil soon come to stay. 

Then it's Hi away on! 

Just then something happened to spoil their 
fun. Omnok, the Eskimo hunter, was far 
over on the other shore in his kiak, but so 
loudly did Miss Swan trumpet that he could 
hear her over there, and in just a second he 
had his terrible boola balls on their cords, and 
was making his paddle go swish, swish in the 
water right over toward Happy Island. 

“Honk, Honk, Trumpet, Trumpet,” called 
Miss Swan as she sailed along at the head of 
the happy circle. “Honk, Honk, Honk.” 
Then she turned about a point of rock, and 
right there in front of them all was Omnok 







In front of them all 


was Omnok. 




84 







































































STATELY MISS SWAN 


85 


with the terrible boola ready to whirl and 
throw. 

“Run! Run!” shrieked Tommie Specks, 
diving and scooting away. “Swim! Swim!” 
shrieked Little Baby Laughing Loon, play¬ 
ing submarine and scooting away. But what 
was Miss Swan to do? She couldn’t dive 
very well and she couldn’t play submarine. 
She just hung her head and expected every 
moment to feel the terrible boola string wind 
about her. But hanging her head happened 
to be the very best thing to do, for just as she 
did it, Omnok’s arm went out and away 
whirred the terrible boola right over Miss 
Swan, and splash! right into the ocean it 
went! And before Omnok could prepare 
another boola Miss Swan swam swiftly away. 

“Your rule does not suit me at all,” said 
Miss Swan to Tommie Specks next day. I d 
rather be quiet and dignified.” 

Tommie couldn’t answer her. He was 
quite sure he had been right about a cheerful 
childhood bringing a cheerful old age, but 
someway his rule didn’t seem to work right 





86 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


that day, so he just said nothing, but went 
over to the land and looked for a shrimp for 
his breakfast. 









LITTLE MISS SNOW BUNTING 



“O Mother!” said Miss Swan as she came 
upon her mother preparing supper, “What 
am I to do?” 

“Why, what’s the matter now!” asked her 
mother, almost laughing in spite of herself at 
the mournful face her beautiful daughter was 
wearing. 

“Well,” said Miss Swan, looking more 
mournful than ever, “You see the other day 
Tommie Specks said that a happy childhood 
helped for a cheerful old age and he went 
skipping about in the water and turning 
handsprings and all that, and Little Baby 
Laughing Loon played submarine and every¬ 
body was having a cheerful childhood but me. 
There wasn’t one cheerful thing I could do. 
I could only go about and arch my neck and 
look at myself in the water. So I went off by 
myself and tried to learn to trumpet and by 
87 



88 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


and by I could trumpet very well. Then I 
went back and trumpeted for all the little 
folks. They thought it was so very nice that 
they all followed me about in a circle and we 
were having such a cheerful childhood. Oh! 
such a cheerful, cheerful childhood! Then 
all of a sudden Omnok the hunter came upon 
us and if I hadn’t hid my face in the water 
you would never have seen me again, I am 
sure. 

“After that, I decided I didn’t want a cheer¬ 
ful old age if I had to be frightened almost to 
death and perhaps killed, so today I just kept 
quiet and didn’t trumpet at all. 1 just floated 
about in the water while all the other folks 
were cheerful, but they weren’t very cheerful, ] 
for they thought I ought to go about and 
trumpet for them and be cheerful too. But I 
didn’t, and by and by I became very sleepy. | 
I thought it wouldn’t be a bit of harm for me I 
to take just a little nap with all the other little i 
folks all about me. So I put my head under ; 
my wing and went to sleep. And O Mother! 
if someone hadn’t bit me on the toe just when 





LITTLE MISS SNOW BUNTING 89 



Soup for Little White Bear’s supper. 


they did I would have been taken home to 
make soup for Little White Bear’s supper. 
Now, what am I to do? If I am cheerful and 
try to have a cheerful childhood Omnok tries 
to catch me and if I am quiet and don’t make 
any noise at all I get sleepy and Big White 
Bear tries to carry me off.” Miss Swan looked 
down at her pink shoes as sadly as Goodie 
Two Shoes must have looked at her one shoe. 























90 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Well,” said her mother in a very gentle 
tone, “That is a hard problem, isn’t it? All 
little folks have problems which are much 
harder to solve than we older people think. 
This is the way it seems to me. Tommie 
Specks was quite right when he said a cheer¬ 
ful childhood stood for a cheerful old age. 
But,—” Mrs. Swan looked very thoughtfully 
at her young daughter, “does it really seem 
necessary to make a loud noise all the time to 
be cheerful?” 

No-o, I don’t believe it does,” said Miss 
Swan, after thinking hard. “I never thought 
of that.” 

“Well, then,” said her mother, “try being 
cheerful and not making much noise, espe¬ 
cially in places where there may be dangers 
lurking. Trumpet all you care to but trumpet 
softly. Some of the very sweetest notes in 
the world are so very soft that the least breath 
of wind bears them away and you do not hear 
them at all.” 

Miss Swan thought about what her mother 
had said all that evening, and next morning 





LITTLE MISS SNOW BUNTING 


91 


she sallied out bravely to meet her young 
playmates and tell them how it all was. They 
were glad to see her and gladly, too, they 
formed in line and followed her about while 
she trumpeted to them in the lowest, sweetest 
notes they had ever heard. Of course Tom- 
j mie Specks had to turn a handspring now and 
then, but he did it very gracefully. Little 
Baby Loon was graceful too, when she 
played submarine, and even the Puffin chil¬ 
dren were more graceful as they played air¬ 
ship and went skimming over the water when 
the others swam too fast for them. So 
they were all having a fine time when all of a 
sudden they heard a voice coming from the 
shore of Happy Island. It was very close to 
them and sounded out so very sharply, “Chee! 
Chee! Chee!” that they were all about to 
scurry away in fright when Miss Swan spied 
the little person who was calling to them. 
Anyone would then have laughed, at their 
fear. The little Bird lady was perched on the 
least bit of a willow twig, and it didn’t bend 
down one bit! She was no larger than Tom- 








JVcis perched on the least bit of a willow twig . 


92 


































































































































































LITTLE MISS SNOW BUNTING 


93 


mie Specks’ head, and not nearly so tall as 
Miss Swan’s boot, but she was such a chic 
little body, and held herself in such a ladylike 
poise that the other Bird children could not 
help but open their mouths and stare. 

“Who are you?’’ asked Miss Swan at last. 

“I’m Little Miss Snow Bunting,’’ replied 
the other very politely. 

“What can you do to be cheerful?’’ asked 
Tommie. “Can you turn handsprings or play 
submarine or can you trumpet?’’ 

“I can do none of those things,’’ said Miss 
Snow Bunting. I have no bathing suit and I 
am not large enough to trumpet, but I can 
sing.’’ At this she sang them a shrill cheerful 
little song about the snow in the cold winter 
time. 

“Don’t sing so loudly, please,” said Miss 
Swan. 

“Well, why not?” asked Miss Snow Bunt¬ 
ing. 

“Someone might come along and want to 
catch you.” 





94 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 



How Miss Snow Bun¬ 
ting did enjoy this! 

“Why ! ” she ex¬ 
claimed a f t e r a while, 
“no one ever wants to 
kill me. I sit right near 
Big White Bear and talk 
to him. I’ve done it 
many, many times, and 
I sing right by Mrs. 
Fox’s door step. I waken 
Omnok, the hunter, and 
send him out to find his 
breakfast, but never 
once did any of them 
want to kill me. I think 
it is because I am so very 
small, and then perhaps 
they really like to hear 
me sing.’’ 

Well, all the other 
little folks wondered 
what to think of that, 
but by and by Tommie 
thought of another ques¬ 
tion to ask. “Why did 


How Miss Snow Bunting did 
enjoy this! 









LITTLE MISS SNOW BUNTING 


95 


you sing about the snow in the cold, cold 
winter time?” he asked. ‘‘You were never 
here in the winter time, were you?” 

‘‘No, I am too young for that,” smiled Miss 
Snow Bunting ,‘‘but my mother has lived here 
for several winters and she learned the song 
so she could teach it to me.” 

“You won’t stay here all winter, will you?” 
asked Tommie, opening his eyes wide. 

“Indeed I shall,” said Miss Snow Bunting, 
bobbing her head vigorously. “Mother says 
it’s the best time of all the year.” 

“I’d like to know what’s nice about all ice 
and snow and no sun and cold, cold all the 
time,” said Tommie in a mean way. “That’s 
just the way it is, for I heard Mrs. Fox telling 
little White Fox about it one day when they 
didn’t know I was about.” 

“Oh! but that isn’t all,” said Miss Snow 
Bunting very mysteriously. “There’s God’s 
moving pictures!” She whispered it so awe¬ 
somely that all the young folks sat quiet and 
wanted her to tell them more about it. “I 
don’t know much about it,” she whispered, 






96 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


“but I heard Old Mrs. Big White Bear tell¬ 
ing her son all about it and her voice wasn’t 
a bit gruff when she told him. I heard Mrs. 
Fox telling Little White Fox about it one eve¬ 
ning when it was bed time, and her voice was 
very gentle, indeed. I heard even the black 
ravens croaking quite sweetly about it, so 
I know it must be very wonderful and grand. 
I wish you could all stay and see God’s mov¬ 
ing pictures; I really do! But I must hurry 
home to tea,’’ and away she flew. 

There was no more trumpeting that day; 
no more handsprings, and no more subma¬ 
rines nor aeroplanes. The little folks were 
all thinking of God’s moving pictures and 
making up their minds to stay and see them. 
We may be sure their mothers had something 
to say to them about that, for none of them 
ever said another word about staying. Only 
Tommie Specks said to himself, “Perhaps 
Miss Snow Bunting will tell us all about it 
when we come back in the spring.” 






OLD TRAMP STORMY PETREL 



Far in the western sky great crowds of 
fairy bird folks were skimming, their filmy 
gowns white as Miss Swan’s bathing suit. 
Little Baby Laughing Loon sat with her feet 
dangling in the water, dreaming of them 
and wondering why she could not join them. 

“I wish I wasn’t so much afraid of trust¬ 
ing myself to the air,” she thought wistfully. 

Behind these airy, cloudy visions of fairy 
bird folks were dark heads popping up now 
and then. ‘‘They are black pirates of fairy 
bird lands,” thought Baby. “I am quite 
sure I should be very much afraid of them, 
97 





98 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


for these fairy birds always scurry along so 
fast that the black heads can do no more than 
appear far in the distance beyond them..” 

Just when she was thinking hardest and 
her dreams seemed most real, she heard the 
clap-clap of wings. 

“Good! Good!” she almost cheered. “They 
are fairy bird folks! They are, for I hear 
their wings!” 

In just a second she had another thought. 
If the fairy bird folks were real, were not 
the black old pirates real also, and wouldn’t 
they go after Little Baby Laughing Loon, 
who was not half so swift as these fairy bird 
folks? 

At that she called, “Mother! Mother!” 
and started to swim away. But just then 
she realized that these wing claps did not 
really come from cloud land, but from very 
much closer—right over her head, in fact, 
she could see the fellow who was doing the 
clapping. She was very much more fright¬ 
ened now, for after all, real things some¬ 
times frighten us the most, and this fellow 





OLD TRAMP STORMY PETREL 


99 


did look so much like Ivory Gull and Kittle 
Wake, the grim sea pirates. 

As she was about to go racing away Baby 
caught a look at the stranger’s face. It was 
an ugly face, but at the same time such a 
good-humored one that Baby concluded that 
the stranger was not a dangerous fellow 
after all. So she waited to see what would 
happen. 

“Good day,” said the stranger, lighting 
on the water in such an airy fashion as not 
to disturb it to a single ripple; so gently, 
indeed, that Baby was half minded after 
all to run away, thinking this one of the 
airy sea pirates she had been dreaming of 
but a moment before. But one glance at 
the stranger’s jolly face reassured her, and 
she settled back in her place and made her 
most mannerly bow. 

“Don’t know me, do you?” said the 
stranger, winking at Baby, while a most en¬ 
gaging smile spread across his face. 

“No, but you’re a jolly looking fellow," 
said Baby, smiling back. 







mm 






Stormy Petrel. 


100 


c , 

* * « 
o *> 

Otic 

?■** 




















































OLD TRAMP STORMY PETREL 


101 


“Why shouldn’t I be?” exclaimed the 
stranger. “I haven’t a care in the world. 
Not a care!” 

“What’s your name?” Baby asked timidly. 

“Stormy Petrel. Some people call me a 
tramp, but I’m not really a tramp. I’m just 
a wanderer, a traveler, if you like it that 
way better.” The stranger’s face grew sud¬ 
denly dreamy. “It’s a great life I lead too,” 
he mused, his eyes half closed. “I am going 
just now to a little cliff I know of far north 
of here, and there while the summer is hot 
and stuffy in other lands I shall camp out 
for a time. But when the first sharp winds 
of winter come, I shall take the breezes 
south. I shall catch the wake of some sail¬ 
ing schooner or a steamer from Nome, and 
the sailors will be glad to see me, for they 
say I bring them good luck. I shall sail 
along in their wake and they will gladly 
feed me. Far to new southern lands rich 
in spicy breezes I shall go and then on and 
on, no one knows where, but always on and 
on, till summer comes again and I seek my 





102 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


cliff in the Arctic lands. Does it not all 
sound very fine?” 

It did sound fine indeed to little Baby 
Laughing Loon. 

“I tell you what!” exclaimed Stormy, com¬ 
ing quite close to Baby and nudging her in 
a manner that Baby did not quite like, “I’ll 
tell you what! You’ll be flying when I come 
back here in the autumn, and you and I’ll go 
on a trip together. A child is always handy 
for a traveler like me. What do you say?” 

Baby was too full of thought to answer, 
so the stranger rose and soared away. That 
night in her home Baby said to her mother, 
“Mother, I’m going to be a tramp, or a tra¬ 
veler, or something when I grow up—just 
such a person as Stormy Petrel is.” 

“All right,” smiled her mother. “You 
may be a traveler like Stormy Petrel, or a 
tramp, as he really is, but first I must tell 
you just the kind of life he really lives. 
Doubtless he told you all about the happy 
side. Well, listen closely while I tell you the 
rest. It is true that the sailors are very glad 




OLD TRAMP STORMY PETREL 


103 


to have him follow their ship, and they do 
feed him very well. These great ships travel 
far over the wide seas where there are terri¬ 
ble storms, and many times when the storm 
is raging wildest the sailors cannot get out to 
throw food to Stormy Petrel, and he is too 
far from land to go to find it, so he suffers 
from hunger. Very often in these wild 
storms he becomes weary and then he rests 
on the waves and falls asleep. When he 
awakes fog has covered the sea, and his ship 
is far away. Then he is alone on the great 
wild sea. If he perishes of hunger, there is 
no one to mourn him; no one to bury him, 
and by and by the red-faced shrimp children 
pick his bones. That’s the other story to 
being a traveler like Stromy Petrel.” 

Baby was silent then, and very soon she 
was fast asleep. The next morning as she 
played with Miss Swan, she said suddenly: 

“I’m not going to be a tramp like Stormy 
Petrel.” 

“Who said you were?” asked Miss Swan. 

Baby did not answer, but went bobbing 
away playing submarine. 




LITTLE BABY LAUGHING LOON 
MEETS LITTLE BROWN SEAL 



“Ho! Ho! Ha! Ha! Ho! Ho! Yak! Yak! 
Yak!” Little Brown Seal seemed to laugh 
rolling his funny round head about in the 
water, till Little Baby Laughing Loon 
thought it would certainly be twisted off 
and go floating about all by itself. 

“You needn’t laugh!” exclaimed Baby 
stamping the water with her dainty feet. 
“It’s no laughing matter!” 

Little Brown Seal only laughed the harder, 
and he was so very good natured, and his 
little round head looked so very much like 
the hoola-hoola ball with which Kituk the 
Eskimo boy played, that Baby Laughing 
Loon had to enjoy looking at Brown Seal 
in spite of herself. Then, of course, she 
felt better, even if she were a bit ashamed 
that she had taken such a tumble from the 
104 


BABY LOON MEETS LITTLE BROWN SEAL 105 


mountain top when there was someone about 
to see her. 

Days and weeks, and even a month or 
two had passed since Little Baby Laugh¬ 
ing Loon had followed Kituk in his kiak, 
and thought he was a great mother, and 
since she had been lost at the festival of 
the Puffins and nearly been carried away 
by the pirates. She had changed her fuzzy- 
wuzzy, woolly-cotton bathing suit for a 
realy-truly grown up suit of feathers, and 
in truth she was almost as large as her 
mother. She might have been very, very 
happy, as most young people are when they 
are just blossoming out into real grown 
folks, but one thing she could not forget. 
She had heard the Puffins’ chorus sing: 

“The earth and the sea and sky’s our 
home,” and she knew it was true, for had 
they not walked and swam and flown away? 
But all three, “land, sea and sky,” belonged 
just as much to the Laughing Loon family. 
Her mother had often said that they did. 
The land? why yes, that did belong to her. 




106 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Did she not wander about among the great 
mysterious grass forests or beneath the great 
towering willows? Was it pleasant to lie 
in the sun when it was not too warm or to 
play about in the shade of an afternoon? 
Yes, indeed,—the land was hers. The sea? 
Did she not swim and dive in all its wonderful 
blue of water and mist and storm? Did 
she not hunt the red faced Shrimp children 
to their homes beneath its surfaces? Yes, 
the sea was hers also. The sky? Well, that 
"was altogether different. Try as she might 
she could not make herself feel that the 
sky was a safe place to be! Sometimes it 
seemed not to be there at all and always 
it seemed to be going this way or that. How 
could one be supposed to ride in it and dive 
in it or lie about upon it? Would it not 
let you fall, far, far down and go crashing 
on the rocks, or would it not carry you far 
away from your friends to lands unknown? 
These questions came to Baby Laughing 
Loon and every time she thought of going 
out upon the sky, she was afraid. The 




BABY LOON MEETS LITTLE BROWN SEAL 107 


wild soaring of the Puffins and of her own 
brothers and sisters could not assure her. 

This day she had grown brave. She 
would soar away in the sky. She just 
would! So she climbed far, far up the side 
of the mountain to the top of a great cliff. 
She thought that surely from here it would 
be only a step right out into the sky. But 
after she had clambered, puffing and pant¬ 
ing, to the very top the sky seemed no 
nearer than before. Such a strange thing 
this sky was anyway! The land now, was 
always much the same and so was the sea. 
Oh, yes,—the sea turned black at times and 
green at others and sometimes it was gray, 
but anyway it was always there. As for 
changing of color why her mother’s splendid 
square checked bathing suit changed too 
when the sun shone upon it. But the sky! 
Why even now it was changing color and 
going away fast. How could she be expected 
to take a ride upon it? 

She had waited and waited and waited 
until a little bit of the sky came quite close 




108 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


to the cliff and she had thought she might 
jump out upon it. Holding her breath hard 
she had spread her wings and given a great 
leap. Alas it would seem that there was 
no sky there at all for down, down she came 
and if there hadn’t been an arm of the kind 
old ocean there to catch her she would cer¬ 
tainly have been killed. As it was she had 
an awful fright, and was all shaken up, and 
to make it worse here was Little Brown 
Seal, a very new companion, laughing at 
her. Was it not all very mean? 

Now as we know, Little Brown Seal 
looked so comical with his hoola-hoola ball 
head and his whiskers, like the white man’s 
cat, that Baby Laughing Loon just had to 
feel joyful in spite of herself. 

“Well,” she said to herself, “anyway here 
is someone who looks as if he would make 
a good playmate and I don’t believe he thinks 
for a moment the sky is his so I think we 
may have some good times together.” 

Some good times they did have after 
that; for Little Brown Seal hadn’t the slight- 





Spread her wings and given a 


great leap. 


109 
















































































110 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


est notion of trying to fly and though he 
had his doubts about the wisdom of Baby 
Laughing Loon’s not trying to make the sky 
her own, he was far too well pleased with 
her company to suggest that she try again 
to climb out upon the sky. 

So the days fled swiftly by and one fine 
morning when the night had been growing 
longer and the winds colder Baby Laughing 
Loon awoke to find all her feathered friends 
gone. They had vanished like the parts of 
the sky which had so disappointed her. 

“Where can they be?” she asked Little 
Brown Seal in great distress. 

Little Brown Seal was a very kind hearted 
fellow, and besides he didn’t feel just right 
about encouraging Baby to play so long with 
him while the fine days were passing, but 
he was also an honest fellow and so he 
said, “They have all started south. Your 
people never stay in my land during the 
long cold winter, so I suppose you must go 
too though I shall miss you very much.” 




BABY LOON MEETS LITTLE BROWN SEAL 111 


Then we may be very sure that Baby felt 
badly indeed. 

“Its all my own fault!” she bravely said, 
“I should have found out how to make the 
sky my own but it looked so very hard! 
Now there is nothing for me to do but to 
swim and the way seems very long. Per¬ 
haps there are many dangers in that strange 
* * 

sea. 

“I will go a long piece with you,” said 
Little Brown Seal generously and away they 
swam together. Sometimes Little Brown 
Seal was on top of the water and sometimes 
underneath, but never far away. 














PIRATES AGAIN 



“What was that?” Baby Laughing Loon 
looked and listened. There it was again 
Clap! Clap! Clap! Surely it was the sound 
of wings. Whose wings could it be? Her 
own people and all the Puffins people as 
well as Mrs. Swan and her family must 
be far, far south by this time for she and 
Little Brown Seal had journeyed on the 
sea days and days already and their journey¬ 
ing had been slow indeed. Once there had 
been a great storm and a strong current. 

112 








PIRATES AGAIN 


113 


That time they swam hard two days and 
only just succeeded in getting beyond a great 
gray rock that stuck out into the sea. For 
a moment Baby hoped it was one of her 
brothers or sisters or even her mother who 
had come back to help her along. But this 
hope very soon vanished and in its place 
came a dark, dark fear. What if it were 
the two gray pirates, Ivory Gull and Kittle 
Wake? What if it were? Baby was afraid! 
If it were, how soon her pretty bathing 
suit might be scattered in little shreds here 
and there on the dark water which even 
now reflected the clouds above. 

She didn’t have long to wait. A darker 
shadow floated over the waters. Baby did 
not dare look up. A new sound came to 
her ears and told her plainer than words that 
she was in danger. It was the two gray 
pirates; she heard their savage teeth grat¬ 
ing as they soared above her, ready at any 
moment to swoop down upon her. 

Wildly Baby looked about her. Where 
was Little Brown Seal? She had not seen 





A darker shadow floated over the waters. 


114 


































































































































PIRATES AGAIN 


115 


him for hours. Had he left her in this 
moment of her need? It must be so for 
he was no where to be seen. Baby scolded 
herself for trusting him. Had he not allowed 
her to go on playing about on the sea? 
Had he not encouraged her to hope she 
might go on and on over the water to her 
southern home? Now he was gone! How 
she wished she had tried harder to make 
the sky her home as well as the sea. But 
there was no help for sad thoughts now. 
In just a few moments she might be no more. 
Already she heard the cold snap! snap! of 
Ivory Gull’s teeth close to her head. Well, 
they should not catch her very easy. She 
dived again and again. But each time her 
strength grew less and less and each time 
the bird pirates managed to come closer 
and closer to her as she rose. 

She had just given up hope and was about 
to cease diving and allow herself to float 
on the surface when she heard a different 
noise. There was a savage snap many times 
louder than Old Ivory Gull’s savage teeth 




116 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


could make, right close to her. Very much 
closer it was to Ivory Gull for with a wild 
frightened scream, he rose high in the air 
and disappeared among the clouds. Kittle 
Wake had not seen and when the snap came 
again he left two long feathers floating in 
the water. 

“I almost caught him!” exclaimed a voice 
close to Baby. It was Little Brown Seal. 

“Yes,,” panted Baby, “but why were you 
so long in coming?” 

“I was right under the water all the time,” 
said Little Brown Seal, “Sometimes it takes 
a great deal to keep away such bold fellows 
as those and I thought it would be better 
for you to tire them out a little before I 
came up. If they come back, there are likely 
to be a whole lot more feathers floating on 
the sea.” 

The two companions traveled on together 
all that day, but the pirates never were seen 
by them again in those waters. They had 
been sufficiently frightened and had prob- 




PIRATES AGAIN 


117 


ably concluded that Baby was too well pro¬ 
tected for them to catch her. 

Night came on at last and with her fright 
and the long, long day of travel Baby Laugh¬ 
ing Loon was glad enough to tuck her head 
under her wing and go fast to sleep, rocked 
in the cradle of the deep.” While she slept 
strange changes were going on up in the 
sky, changes which at first she would not 
understand. 

She awoke at last “to a world unknown.” 
While she slept everything had turned white. 
Everything but the sea and that was looking 
very gray at the sight of things about it. 
Beneath a hood of white, Little Brown Seal 
was cheerfully looking at her. She had half 
a mind to be frightened, the sky looked so 
very strange, all white as it was. As she 
looked she saw that it was all make up of 
little particles. 

“Oh!” she exclaimed clapping her wings 
in her excitement, the sky has all come to 
pieces and is falling down!” 




118 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Little Brown Seal enjoyed this more than 
ever. He was very much older than Baby 
and wouldn’t make such a queer mistake. 
He was just going to tell her how it all was 
when Baby said something which told him 
it might be much better to let her find things 
out for herself, a little at a time. 

“Good! good!” she exclaimed, clapping 
her wings louder than ever, “I believe I 
can get thousands and thousands of those 
little pieces under each wing and go flying 
away over the sky which is all falling down!” 
This was such a strange idea that Little 
Brown Seal had to laugh in spite of him¬ 
self, but Baby thought he was just laughing 
for joy and felt more sure than ever that 
she could do it. 

I shouldn’t be at all surprised if you 
could,” said Little Brown Seal after a while. 
“It would not be strange at all.” 

Then, with her heart beating very loudly 
Baby gave a great spring out of the water 
at the same time spreading each wing over 




PIRATES AGAIN 


119 


thousands and thousands of pieces of the 
sky. Up she went right into the air just 
jumping from one thousand of pieces to 
another with every fresh flap of her strong 
wings. Away, and away she went till she 
was hid by the bits of sky and Little Brown 
Seal saw her no more. 

“She is just like a great many other people 
in the world,” said Little Brown Seal to 
himself, “She needs to think she has some¬ 
thing a little extra to hold her up. Those 
little bits of snow wouldn’t hold up the 
least bit of moss blown about by a summer 
breeze, but she didn’t know that. Her 
wings were strong enough all the time and 
now she will go flying home to her friends 
and her mother. I shall miss her very much 
but winter will be here very quickly and 
she would have starved on the ice while I 
can have my home right where it is thickest. 
Next spring I shall see her again. Then 
he gave a little flip and was gone. 

On and on Little Baby Laughing Loon 
went fast as the wind. Such fun as it was 




120 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


jumping from bit to bit of the falling sky! 
Then at last she began thinking of Little 
Brown Seal, and how kind he had been to 
her and quite forgot where she was. At 
last she looked about her and saw everything 
strange. The falling sky was all gone and 
she was sailing through just nothing at all, 
or that’s the way it seemed to her. Whe’e’e! 
she was frightened just for a moment but 
then she thought to herself, “If I can go 
along here I can go anywhere so away I 
go,” and she went spinning on faster than 
ever. That is how Baby Laughing Loon 
discovered what the sky really was and how 
she might make it her home. 










GOD’S GREAT MOVING PICTURES 



It was Autumn now and far away in her 
own northern land was little Miss Snow 
Bunting, and near her in their snug home 
were our little Eskimo friends. Down from 
the north had stolen the cold, cold winter 
time. So silently had he come upon the 
land that he caught all the willow shrubs 
with their summer dresses on and all winter 
long they shivered and sighed as they were 
tossed about by the winter blasts which 
rustled their summer gowns. To Miss Snow 
Bunting this was the most happy time, in¬ 
deed, for she hid herself away beneath the 
skirts of a short chubby willow, and behind 
these protecting covers, she defied the fiercest 
blast. All night long as she heard the ice 
crackling and booming away, as winter 
sewed the blanket over even the black old 
121 


122 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


ocean, she was snug and warm. Then the 
sun left and the many, many stars, the 
twinkling golden snowflakes of the sky, came 
out and stayed all day and night. Miss Snow 
Bunting was very happy in her winter abode, 
and there were things to eat, too. Oh! 
Plenty of things to eat! There were whole 
fields of spicy flower seeds stowed away in 
little pods on the hillsides, while at the foot 
of the hills were bushes and bushes of lus¬ 
cious frozen blueberries, and the tundra was 
waving red here and there with dried salmon 
berries. This living in Alaska land in the 
long, long winter time is not without a most 
wonderful reward. 

We must not forget that the little Eskimo 
boy and girl had said that it would be nice 
to stay in this, their own land for a very, 
very special reason. Well, one night when 
the golden moon was circling low, almost 
touching the blanket of old ocean, and the 
golden snowflakes were winking, winking at 
one another and at Miss Snow Bunting, there 
came a moment when all the frozen land 




GOD’S GREAT MOVING PICTURES 


123 


seemed to be expecting something, some¬ 
thing very grand, indeed! As she put her 
baby fox to sleep, Mrs. Fox might have 
been whispering, “Sleep now, for by and 
by you must waken.” So the little folks 
hid their eyes and went right to sleep, for 
indeed they must be wide awake by and 
by. In her snug home under the skirts of 
the willow, perhaps Miss Snow Bunting was 
saying to herself, “I’ll just take one little 
nap now, just a quick nap; then I’ll be fresh 
and bright for seeing and understanding it 
all.” The black ravens did not forget, nor 
Black Fox, nor his relatives. Red Fox and 
Silver Fox, nor Violet Blue Fox nor Cross 
Fox. They all remembered. Tusks, the 
walrus, burst a hole through the solid blanket 
of the ocean to see and Little Brown Seal 
breathed on his air hole to keep it open so 
he could peek out. Everyone, everywhere, 
even Omnok, the hunter, put down the thing 
he was working at and seemed to be waiting, 
waiting for something great and wonderful 
to happen. 




124 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


Now and then Mrs. White Bear looked 
out of her ice palace toward the northern 
sky. Little Miss Snow Bunting looked too, 
and so did all the creatures of the northern 
world except the children who were asleep. 

At last it seemed to be coming. Some¬ 
thing was appearing in the northern sky. 
What was it? The little Eskimo boy and 
girl were awake and whispered, “Is it going 
to be beautiful?” The mothers and fathers 
only put their hands over the children’s 
mouths, and said, “Sh! don’t talk; just look.” 

“I wonder if it is really coming?” the lit¬ 
tle girl whispered as she put her hand over 
her heart to still its beating. 

Far in the northern sky something was 
coming. Something very great and far more 
wonderful than the golden sun or the silvery 
moon. It grew brighter and brighter, till 
at last one could tell just what it was. 

“Yes, yes,” whispered the little boy, “it 
is coming; there is the curtain. It is com¬ 
ing.” They sat quite still, half hiding under 




GOD’S GREAT MOVING PICTURES 


125 


the warm folds of their mother’s deer-skin 
porka. 

Before them hung the mightiest, most 
beautiful, most wonderful curtain that ever 
man or creature saw. No king’s palace was 
ever hung with curtain half so magnificient. 
A light golden yellow its folds were at first, 
with the deep gray of an autumn sea hidden 
behind them. Turning like the rays of an 
jautumn moon, it grew golden as harvest, 
and all the time it spread across the sky a 
thousand miles high • and wide as the world 
is wide. Slowly the colors changed to a 
golden red while behind its folds deepened 
the dark, dark green of some long-lost ocean 
cave. The little girl hid her face for awe of 
it. We may be sure all the little foxes and 
the little bears, all the reindeer and caribou, 
all the wolves and the ptarmigan came out to 
see, and before this great and mysterious cur¬ 
tain stood in silence, longing for God’s great 
moving pictures to appear, yet fearing almost 
to look, and indeed fearing very much to 





Turning like the rays of an autumn moon. 


126 










































GOD’S GREAT MOVING PICTURES 


127 


move or to say one word lest the great 
wonder might vanish. 

Slowly the curtain began to rise. Up, up, 
slowly it rolled up, up, while all eyes stared, 
all hearts beat high, all lips were still. But 
right here we must stop, for only to those 
brave people and those hardy creatures of 
the far northland is it given to know what 
is done in God’s great moving pictures. If 
you would know, you must go to live there 
years and years and years. It can not be 
truly told, and the creatures of this arctic land 
could never tell. 

All that can be told is that after hours 
and hours of grandeur and splendor, the peo¬ 
ple all went back to their homes silent, not 
saying one word, but just thinking. We 
may know this; to the great and powerful 
the pictures meant something very different 
than they did to the meek and gentle, but to 
each there was a message just as there would 
be to any one of us if we were to live years 
and years in that strange, silent, lonesome 
land. If we were to guess, we would say 




128 


THE NORTHLAND BIRD LIFE 


that to the great and strong the pictures 
would tell of the greatness and strength of 
God, and to the meek and lowly ones they 
would tell of God’s great goodness. 

As for the little boy and girl, they crept 
away back into their cozy home, and were 
not sorry—no, not sorry at all, but glad as 
glad could be that they were not with the 
bird folks in their southern winter homes. 
They felt that the glory of this one night 
was worth all the darkness and the lonesome¬ 
ness and the silence they had endured in 
this their own land, and we may be sure 
that is just the way we would feel if we 
ever went to live in that wonderful land. 

If, on some cold winter’s night you chance 
to be looking away toward that northern 
land, and you catch faint glimpses of some 
lights shooting toward the sky from far, far 
away, and men tell you it is the aurora or 
the northern lights, just remember that this 
is the time when the folks of that cold land 
are viewing once more, as often before, the 
wonders of God’s great moving pictures. 

FINIS 









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